peters



UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JOHN I-I. BELTER, OF NEW' YORK, N. Y.

BUREAU'.

Specification of Letters Patent No.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, JOHN HENRY BELTER, of the city, county, and State 0f New York, have invented certain new and useful I1nprovements in Bureaus; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description thereof, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, which make part of this specification, and in which- Figure 1 is a plan view illustrating the construction of the sides of a drawer. Fig. 2 is a plan view of a drawer complete. Fig. 8 is a vertical section across the entire bureau from front to back. Fig. is a vertical section at right angles to the last. Fig. 5 is a perspective view of the whole bureau complete. Fig. 6 is a front elevation, and Fig. `7 is an end elevation of the same.

Similar letters of reference indicate like parts in all the drawings.

My invention comprises several novel points of importance which I will describe separately.

The first feature of my invention consists in constructing the sides or vertical portions of each drawer from a single sheet of pressed work and gluing the same in a continuous line to a bottom'of cross laid or other unchangeable material in the manner and so as to secure advantages which will be explained below.

The second feature of my invention consists in a manner of securing all the drawers by causing the lock of a single drawer to operate a bolt with duplicate hooks or an equivalent device in opposition to the tension` of a spring or an equivalent force which is capable of operating the device in the reverse direction so soon as the bolt of the lock is withdrawn.

The third feature of my invention consists in connection with the last named feature, in the employment of springing catches on the several drawers and of a rigid disposition of the locking device whereby any drawer which is open orV partly open when the key is turned in locking will remain unlocked until it is thrust in to its full and proper extent and when thus thrust in will become firmly locked like the rest without meanwhile affecting the security of the other drawers,

The fourth feature of my invention consists in arranging the above named secondary locking bolt in or near the center of the 26,881, dated January 24, 1860.

back of the bureau and the knob or equivalent handle opposite 0r very nearly opposite thereto and arranging both the handle and the locking catch at or near the bottom of the drawer, whereby in an attempt to pull open a drawer when the bureau is locked the strain is a simple tension strain and is transmitted in a right, or nearly, line from the handle to the locking catch.

I will now by the aid of the drawings proceed more lfully to describe the manner in which I construct and operate my invention.

Pressed work is a term employed to designate the peculiar material which results when several layers of veneers and fresh glue are 'compressed between curvedV surfaces with the grain of each veneer standing at right angles to that in the next layer, and the whole held in a bent condition until it is cold. The material is from its nature of very extraordinary strength and is not like other wood expanded and contracted in any direction by changes of t-he degree of moisture in the air.

I have discovered that pressed work, although very rigid and unchangeable in every respect after it is dried, changes its form within a brief period after it is removed from the cawls, and that the change is uniform, or nearly so, and is of such a character as to increase its curvature. In consequence of this discovery I find that by manufacturing a sheet of pressed work in the form shown by g G Gr Gr G g in Fig. l it will lafter being removed from the cawls K exhibit a tendency to spring into the form shown by the corresponding lines in Fig. 2 which is the form proper for the entire four sides of my drawers. After the removal of a suficie'nt quantity from the ends g g by any suitable tool the sheet voluntarily assumes such a form, and, unless compelled temporarily to yield by its elasticity to some force from without, it permanently maintains it. Were it not for this property of the material, to bend more inA drying, such a result could not be attained, because the ends of a sheet of pressed work are from the nature of the manufacture ragged and imperfect and a portion always requires to be removed, which would leave an open gap unless forcibly sprung together. I make the front side G G thicker than the other sides by introducing more veneers therein and allowing a correspondingly increased thickness between the eawls at that part as on each side stands at right angles to that of the central sheet. I then glue the whole lower edge of the pressed sides to one of the faces of this bottom, thus fixing it firmly thereto at every point. This completes the description of the first feature of my invention. It produces a drawer which may be very thin without compromising itsV strength. It is unchangeable in dimensions, with corners rounded and continuous in lieu of jointed and weak, and the bottom stiEens and strengthens the drawer in all directions, being as able to resist a rend ing as a crushing force. In all drawers previously constructed the sides have increased and diminished their heights with each change in the hygrometic condition of the air, making open joints in dry weather, and in order to allow the bottom to change its figure from the same cause without distorting or destroying the drawer it has been inserted loosely in a groove or attached in an equivalent manner so that it has been of little effect in strengthening the sides. I do not cut the bottom to correspond exactly with the outline of the sides g Gr Gr G G g but allow it to extend beyond them as shown at z. z. in Fig. 2. I groove the sides of the case to correspond therewith and allow the projecting edges h z. of the bottom of the drawers to traverse in these grooves when the drawers are pulled out or shoved in. I make the sides of such height that each drawer occupies the whole space between the drawer below and the drawer above, and omit the stretcher which in all ordinary bureaus extends across the frontv between each drawer and the next, and also omit the cleats which in ordinary bureaus extend along the inside of the case from the front to the back to guide and support the drawers.

Secondly I provide a tumbler lock F on the upperV drawer M and allow the bolt f to project into the xed work above and conne the drawer M in the ordinary manner. I also mount a bolt D, in a suitable groove in the back of the bureau so that it is free to rise and sink and I suspend in a suitable groove under the t-op of the bureau, a lever B one end of which I connect to the bolt D as represented. The other end of this lever I locate in the path of the bolt f of the lock F. When the bolt f is moved upward by turning the key J to secure the drawer M it also moves the lever B and slides the bolt D. I provide a spring C as represented which depresses the forward end of the lever B whenever thebolt f does not project and prevent it; and thus by the tension of C the bolt D is elevated.V The bolt D is provided with hooks d corresponding to the position of the several drawers M, M2, etc.,

Y and I provide guards E', which prevent D from being drawn toward the front of the bureau. The hooks (Z are allowed to seize each its corresponding drawer, M', M2, or M3, whenever the bolt D is depressed, but releases it whenever D is elevated. By this means the turning of the key J in the drawer M locks all the drawers in the whole bureau, and the turning of the same in an opposite direction unlocks them all without requiring any additional operation. The labor of locking and unlocking the bureau is diminished by my invention and each of the drawers M', M2, M3, is confined as securely as if it was provided in the ordinary manner with a duplicate of the lock F which may-as only one is required-be of a very costly character.

I am aware that bolts similar to my bolt D (l have before been known, and that such are common in safe and bank vault doors but I am not aware that the lock of a drawer has ever been made to confine and release other drawers by means as 'convenient as mine.

I am aware that Ignatius Lutz and Geo. Wode have shown in their respective patents or applications therefor certain means of confining certain drawers by a bolt analogous to my bolt D d arranged so asv to be operated by the pushing in and drawing out of another drawer but this was not the equivalent of my invention inasmuch as it was necessary in their invention to draw out one drawer in order to release the others and to hold open the one drawer during the whole period which was desired that the other drawers should remain in an unlocked condition. My'invention involves no such inconvenience but allows the upper drawer to be operated in precisely the ordinary manner, while the others are operated more easily. This completes the description of the second feature of my invention.V

Thirdly I effect the junction between the several hooks Z and their corresponding drawers by means of the links m which are elastic and attached to the bottoms of the drawers at the points m. If one of these drawers is either by chance or design open when the key J is operated, such drawer will not at that time be secured. In the figures the drawers M and M3 are securely locked but the drawer M2 is free or unlocked. If the drawer M2 be now shut the link m thereof will be depressed as soon as its end meets the inclined face of CZ and when it is fully shoved in to its proper shut condition the link m rises and seizes al without having meanwhile elevated the bolt D at all. In all ordinary spring locks the bolt itself is allowed to spring, an operation which would endanger the security of the other drawers as a skillful person might by pulling on them while slowly shutting the first drawer open them during the elevation of D. This completes the description of the third feature o-f my invention.

Fourthly I locate my bolt D in or near the center of the back of the bureau and attach my links m to the corresponding points in the bottom of the several drawers. I attach my handles I to the centers of the fronts at or near the bases thereof. The bottom of each drawer being manufactured and glued as before described it follows that if, while t-he bureau is locked, a pull is made on the handle I to open a drawer it results simply in a tensile strain along a right line across the bottom and not in a transverse or a torsional strain on the sides. In drawers which lock to a stretcher as usual the strain is twisting or torsional on the front piece and if ordinary drawers should be locked in the manner here shown the bottom would be of no effect in strengthening them and the strain would be resisted by the sides alone at a great disadvantage. There is therefore in the union of my peculiar locking with my peculiar construction of drawer a greatly increased ability to resist such strains.

It is obvious I can place my bolt D a little aside from the center of the back in order to confound a thief or paul pry who might attempt to reach it by boring or other violence, or I can duplicate the bolts D and their connections, as also the handles I without materially compromising the advantages due to this arrangement. This completes the description of the fourth feature of my invention.

In addition to the several features and advantages before enumerated my bureau is superior in appearance to any other in use by reason of the absence of stretchers and of key hole and locks. The sides of the whole series of drawers may if I choose be constructed from a single broad sheet of pressed worlr-sawing them apart at such heights as may be required. By this means the whole front may be made to exhibit a degree of unity hardly practicable or possible where stretchers are required.

Having now fully described my invention what I claim as new in the construction of bureaus and desire to secure by Letters Patent is l. The within described specific construction and union of the sides and bottom of the drawers whereby are obtained the advantages herein set forth.

2. The within described manner of locking and unlocking all the drawers by the lock of a single drawer and the spring C or its equivalent.

3. The springing catches m combined and arranged relatively to the rigidly locked bar D d or its equivalent, substantially in the manner herein set forth, so as to allow a drawer or drawers to remain free at pleasure after the single lock F has been locked and subsequently to lock them in the manner and with the advantages herein shown.

4. The within described combination and arrangement of the locking devices d m and of the handle I with the herein described const-ruction of the drawers for the purpose herein set forth.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto affixed my name.

J. H. BELTER. [Ls] Witnesses:

THOMAS D. STETSON, CHS. HARTWELL. 

